Here you can follow our sailing from Sweden to the Mediterranian.We have a new yacht s/y Carpe Diem, Jeanneau Sun Odyssey 40. Of practical reasons we are still using the homepage of our previous yacht s/y Xavita.

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More visiting yachts arrived to Tanger. When not founding visitor’s moorings, they moored alongside us. Finally there were 4 yachts moored alongside pulling our mooring lines in the fresh wind. The closest Spanish yacht handed over two bottles of tasty wine thankfully of being allowed to scrub topsides with us. Our plan was to continue along the Morocco coast down to Rabat. But the engine refused to start due to a flat start battery and a generator that had got some cooling water. One of the faults was probably due to the other one. We installed the spare generator. We changed plans and headed for Madeira.

Outside Gibraltar Strait we turned up in thick fog in the night and unpleasantly close to the shipping lane. With radar and AIS we considered to have good control of the surroundings. A fishing boat urged via radio to keep clear of his nets. While we were occupied by keeping away from the nets , suddenly a ship turned up out of the fog unpleasantly close to us. We had not seen the ship on the radar and it had no AIS on board (which is a requirement in a ship of that size), It had also not seen our AIS signal, if they were awake at all. A quick maneuver by us cleared the dangerous situation. Lesson learned, Do not trust in others seeing you and have a continuous look out in fog.

The remaining part of the 4½ day and night trip to Porto Santo was made with 7-10 m/s northerlies giving us a beam reach and a broad reach. Reefed main and reefed genua with 5-6 knots speed, in other words fine sailing. The waves of the Atlantic are totally different from the North Sea and the Mediterranean. They are loooong! Some single ships could be seen at the horizon in night time and a full moon lit up our way. Via HAM-radio we received weather reports, so called GRIB-files, twice daily and besides e-mails with advice from sailing friends in Sweden regarding our electrical problems. The air temperature went down to 22 degrees centigrade and the sun was hiding behind clouds, that felt really nice.

Porto Santo, a neighbor island to Madeira has a large and roomy harbor, this because the island has had an important NAVO airfield. Here you can find empty places on the visitor´s pontoon, but we are swinging for anchor in the harbor basin. Met our friends Gunnar and Eva from the canals. Several boats underway to the ARC-rally have made a stop over here. The ARC starts every year from the Canary Islands in November and goes to the Caribbean. The concrete pier is full of paintings/.business cards from earlier yachts. We have identified paintings of several members of our yacht club.

There is a tiny sailing boat here with Sven Yrvind! He is a famous designer of very small yachts and has his personal ideas of how a small boat should be designed. Sven sailed nonstop from Ireland to here in 30 days. He will continue from here directly to Martinique in the Caribbean during 2 months. His boat is 4.8 m long and has a beam of 1.3 m!!! He visited our yacht and told about his life and adventures. A fascinating and different person!

A 3-day festival in honour of Christofer Columbus. He lived here during several years and married the governor´s daughter. A replica of his ship Santa Maria came here to participate in the festival. We made some nice photos when she sailed with all sails hoisted and the crew dressed in 16th century clothes. Ashore plays and concerts are made to celebrate the islands famous son.

Porto Santo is an old volcanic island. The rock is so soft that rainwater makes deep cuts in the steep slopes and the mountain sides are subject to heavy erosion. Next to the harbor there is a wonderful long beach caressed by the waves of the Atlantic Ocean.